CNN —
The only daughter of the late Elvis Presley and Priscilla Presley, singer Lisa Marie Presley has been in the spotlight from the start.
And public interest in her life — from her marriages to her private tragedies — never waned until, like her father, she was abducted too early.
Lisa Marie Presley died Thursday after suffering apparent cardiac arrest. She was 54.
“Priscilla Presley and the Presley family are shocked and devastated by the tragic death of their beloved Lisa Marie,” the family said in a statement provided to CNN. “They are deeply grateful for everyone’s support, love and prayers and ask for privacy at this very difficult time.”
Days before her hospitalization, Lisa Marie and Priscilla Presley attended the Golden Globe Awards in support of the Baz Luhrmann film “Elvis,” with actor Austin Butler receiving an award for his portrayal of the king.
Lisa Marie Presley’s life in pictures
Born in 1968 at the height of Elvis’ fame, Lisa Marie Presley was considered the princess of the man hailed as the “King of Rock ‘n’ Roll”.
Elvis and Priscilla Presley separated in 1972 when their daughter was four, and she was only nine when her father died in 1977. He was 42.
She soon began playing and experimenting with drugs, leading to her mother sending her to a variety of private schools, including a boarding school in Ojai. Lisa Marie Presley remarked to the Los Angeles Times in 2003 that as a child she was “kind of a loner, a melancholy and odd kid.”
“I was in a really self-destructive mode for a while,” she told the publication. “I never really fit into school. I didn’t really have a direction.”
She was also the ultimate sole heir to Elvis’ estate and his sprawling Graceland mansion in Memphis, Tennessee. However, her father’s powerful and ever-threatening legacy did not deter her from her desire to pursue a music career of her own.
Lisa Marie Presley launched her career in 2003 with her debut studio album, To Whom It May Concern, which reached #5 on the Billboard 200 albums chart and went gold that summer. She wrote almost all of the lyrics on the album and co-wrote every tune.
Back then, Lisa Marie Presley told Larry King that she needed to “park” feelings of pressure and comparisons to her legendary singing father.
“If I had thought about it, worried about what I’ve had for a long time, I would never have done what was kind of innate in my heart, in my soul,” she said. “So I had to stop worrying about it or it was too intimidating.”
Also around the same time, Lisa Marie Presley reflected on whether her famous name was a hindrance or a help, telling Playboy that she’s not “asking tabloids to chase me around every week.”
But, she added, she “would never take back any part of who I am or where I came from.”
“I would never want to be a part of anything else,” she said. “I feel honored and proud of my family and my father.”
That first record was followed by two more albums, 2005’s Now What and 2012’s Storm & Grace.
Parallel to her musical activities, Lisa Marie Presley has been married four times, including to music superstar Michael Jackson and actor Nicolas Cage.
She married musician Danny Keough in 1988, with whom she had a daughter, Riley Keough, and a son, Benjamin Storm Keough.
The couple divorced in May 1994, and about three weeks later Lisa married Marie Presley Jackson in a ceremony that made headlines around the world.
In a 2003 interview with ABC News and Diane Sawyer, she remarked of Jackson, “If he wants to bind you, if he wants to intrigue you or captivate you, or you know, whatever he wants to do to you, he can do it.” She added that she “fell into this whole thing, ‘You poor, sweet, misunderstood man, I’m going to save you.’ … I fell in love with him.”
Their marriage ended in January 1996.
Two years later, she married Cage after meeting him at a party, but remained married to him for only three months, from August to November 2002. The divorce was finalized in 2004.
Her fourth marriage was in 2006 to her guitarist, record producer and director Michael Lockwood. The couple welcomed twins Finley Aaron Love Lockwood and Harper Vivienne Ann Lockwood in 2007. They divorced in 2016.
In 2020, Lisa Marie Presley’s son Benjamin Keough died by suicide at the age of 27. Last July, she celebrated the second anniversary of Keough’s death on Instagram, sharing a photo of her matching foot tattoos.
Last September, she wrote an essay for National Grief Awareness Day in which she spoke about the loss of her son.
“The lives of me and my three daughters as we knew it were utterly devastated and devastated by his death. We all live in this. Singles. day,” she wrote. “Grief is something you have to carry with you for the rest of your life, regardless of what certain people or our culture would have us believe. You ‘can’t get over it’, you’re ‘don’t move on’, period.”
Presley also said in the essay that she has found solace in the company of people who have experienced a similar tragedy, adding that her daughters help her keep her feet on the ground.
“I keep going for my girls,” she wrote. “I am continuing because my son has made it very clear in his final moments that caring for and taking care of his little sisters is at the forefront of his concerns and thoughts. He absolutely adored her and she him.”
Tributes to Lisa Marie Presley poured in as news of her death spread.
“This is devastating news. Lisa had the biggest laugh of anyone I’ve ever met. She lit up every room and I’m heartbroken,” Cage said in a statement from his manager, Mike Nilon. “I find some comfort in believing that she is reunited with her son Benjamin.”
Actor John Travolta wrote that he would miss his friend “but I know I will see you again”.
“My love and heart goes out to Riley, Priscilla, Harper and Finley,” he wrote on Instagram.
Actress Leah Remini said she was “heartbroken by the death of Lisa Marie Presley,” adding, “Lisa has not had an easy life as some might think.”
“May she be at peace and rest with her son and father now,” she wrote Twitter.
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“Lisa Marie’s final resting place will be at Graceland, alongside her beloved son Ben,” a family representative said in a statement to CNN on Friday.